At a soft tap, she opened her door only a crack, wondering who on earth would be there now. A sturdy footman in livery stood solidly blocking the opening with her aunt peering over his shoulder. “It’s all right, Lucy. This is James. He’s going to take your trunk out to the carriage.”
She flashed her aunt an incredulous look. Usually, the two of them traveled by hired hack if they were going any distance. Otherwise, most of the time they walked.
“We’re going to Montcliffe Abbey for the holidays.”
Lucy sidled around James as he bent to hoist her trunk onto his shoulder. She wrapped her aunt in a fierce embrace and whispered into her ear. “What sort of adventure are we off on now?”
Her aunt merely smiled. “You’ll see.”
* * *
WILHELMINA TINDALL’S DIARY
June 21,1833
Mayfair, London
Sweet Harry visited today with his new open coach to take Lucy and me riding along Rotten Row. Lucy was so excited, she only nibbled at our nuncheon with tea.
Harry, er, Lord Shropshire, is much older, at least five and thirty, but he makes me smile. Sir Cinnamon detests him, but there aren’t many people he does like, besides me. My silly, beloved cat and I are both in agreement on the odious qualities of His Grace.
Even Lady Fitzroy was over the moon when Baron Shropshire began calling on me about a week ago. He seems quite wealthy, at least Papa seems to think so. Maybe he’s not as interested in my dowry as all the others who have been so attentive of late.
Things have been eerily quiet from you know who. Apparently, Julian hasn’t been able to dig up any nasty, dark secret about Harold Sumner, Baron Shropshire. Perhaps he’s at last given up trying to manage my life from the shadows. I should be relieved…
9
MAY 1826
MONTCLIFFE ABBEY
Mina’s bare toes gripped beneath the top rung of a chair leaning against the window in her bedchamber to steady herself while she stretched out toward the limb of the nearby oak tree. She stared intently at the pinched, white face of Lucy Phippen who clung to the branch and flailed with her feet trying to make her way back up to the first-story bedroom.
“Please, Lucy, grab onto my hand. I promise I won’t let you fall.”
“Oh, no. It was your wild promises that put me into this horrible situation, Mina.”
“It’s not that far to the ground, Lucy. Honest. It’s much safer if you just let go and…” At that, the girl’s grip on the branch loosened, and with a piteous moan followed by a scream loud enough to raise three generations of dead Tindalls in the nearby chapel graveyard, Lucy thudded to the ground below.
Mina’s heart flopped and ended up in the vicinity of her stomach. She’d probably killed her best, and only, friend of the female persuasion. And then the unthinkable happened. When she let go of the chair rung in despair, she herself slid toward the ground. Head-first.
The sudden swell of a duet of moans and screams finally rousted the two front hallway footmen and three grooms from the stables.
Two small girls lay flat on the ground beneath the old oak tree near the Abbey’s east wing, their arms and legs splayed in eight different directions.
Two footmen and a groom from the stable arrived soon after, shaking their heads. “Go find Lord Rumsford,” the groom shouted, and sent one of the footmen running.
* * *
Viscount Rumsford leanedhis muscular shoulders back into his desk chair and stared at his cherubic daughter, her honey-blonde hair askew, leaves still scattered here and there amongst the soft curls.
Fabric hung from a large tear above the hem of her dress, and her feet were bare, scratched, and bleeding. A wrist she struggled vainly to hide from him looked suspiciously swollen.
God’s toes, the child was only eleven. How in the name of the gods would he be able to see her safely, and hopefully happily, married in less than ten years?
She’d read throughThe Odysseyat a break-neck pace, and now she’d somehow found an English translation of theIliadand was racing through that as well. Her governess had discovered the tome buried below a tangle of discarded stockings at the bottom of her wardrobe.
At first, he’d been happy at the improvement in her manners and comportment after the arrival of Mrs. Phippen’s niece. Now, it appeared Mina had also somehow managed to corrupt the poor girl. Flying out of a bedchamber window in an attempt to climb down the oak tree…it’s a wonder one of the girls had not broken her neck. He gave out a long sigh.
